Chris Tusa Biography

My grandmother’s teeth stare at her
from a mason jar on the nightstand.

The radio turns itself on,
...

Deep in the cotton petals of a watermark
I see my father stacking sheets of plywood,

his hands freckled with sawdust, his silvery
...

Divine and white,
you’re an aspirin fit for the gods,
the powdery ghost of Gandhi
conjured into a bottle,
...

Only three days and already I loathe this place,
this milk-white morgue, this smiling slaughterhouse,
where girls in straitjackets grow fat on pills,
floating on pale clouds of Clozapine,
...

A sudden surge of boys
with their smiles punched out,
care of a local Tough Man contest.
It was all I needed
...